Before I started working from home last year, I worked in Kearney Mesa. One of my favorite neighborhood spots for lunch was Gualbertos #4 in Kearny Mesa, which, aside from having a terrible name was a seriously wonderful taco shop.

I recently swung by there twice last month and was disheartened to discover the shop has lost its value and quality. On the first trip, I got one of my favorite dishes at the place, the Hawaiian burrito (something you cannot get anywhere else). It’s a carne asada burrito paired with pineapple and ham slices. If you like Hawaiian pizza, you’ll probably like this, if not, you’ll probably be disgusted by its mere existence. My BF got a carne asada torta, which ended up being soggy and not particularly flavorful.

While my beloved Hawaiian burrito was as delicious as I remembered it, my stomach started killing me about a half hour after I ate it. Since my boy friend’s stomach was fine and I always seemed to have stomach issues, I chalked it off to my normal belly problems.

The next week though, we tried Gualbertos again, and I found out that it was most certainly fallen from glory. When I used to work there, you could get a massive pile of nachos, loaded with sour cream, meat, guacamole, etc. My boyfriend and I both ordered nachos this time -his with pollo asada -which had so little flavor it was essentially just regular grilled chicken meat, and mine with carnitas.

The restaurant now filled up only the front half of the container with chips, cheese and meat and reserved the back for beans, guacamole, salsa and sour cream. Although the price was the same as it was a year ago, we essentially got about half of the quantity. Even worse, the bland chicken must not have been good because while my stomach didn’t hurt after eating the carnitas, my boyfriend’s iron-cast stomach was essentially slaughtered for the rest of the night.

After two bouts of stomach troubles, seriously decreased portions and a few mediocre meals, I’ve called it quits with Gualbertos. In fact, the restaurant has dropped their rating from a 5 out of 5, to a 2 out of 5.